NBC's Richard Engel Shares Heartbreaking Reaction to New Medical Breakthrough That Could Potentially Have Saved His Son

Yahoo

23-05-2025

Richard Engel penned an emotional personal essay about the first-ever personalized gene-editing treatment, which potentially could have saved his son Henry's life
The NBC News chief foreign correspondent announced with a post on X in August 2022 that he lost his son after a years-long battle with Rett Syndrome
Engel is also a father to son Theodore, 5, whom he shares with his wife MaryRichard Engel candidly shared his emotions about a recent medical breakthrough.
After reading a New York Times report about a baby being healed from a rare genetic disorder with the first-ever personalized gene-editing treatment, the NBC News chief foreign correspondent, 51, penned an emotional personal essay about how the new medical breakthrough could have potentially saved his son Henry's life, who died in 2022 after being diagnosed with Rett Syndrome.
"I wished I could have broken the story with Henry as patient zero," he wrote in the essay published on TODAY. "I had imagined the roll-out too, coming back on the set of TODAY with Henry and his mother Mary, who has written about Henry's life and losing him for TODAY.com."
"We'd sit with Savanah Guthrie, who has been supporting ongoing research using Henry's cells, and talk — cautiously, hopefully and thankfully — about the progress we were seeing," continued Engel. "I allowed myself to imagine saying that Henry was starting to speak. He had been awakened, cured and reborn. There wouldn't be a dry eye in the studio."
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"I never got to do that story about Henry. Sometimes our timelines don't overlap with scientific progress. They rarely do," he wrote. "Mary and I are full of nothing but joy that from now on, so many other families will be able to write new and wonderful stories of their own."
The journalist first announced with a post on X in August 2022 that his 6-year-old son had died after a years-long battle with Rett Syndrome, a rare genetic neurological disorder that leads to severe physical and cognitive impairments and has no cure, according to the Mayo Clinic.
Henry, whom Richard shares with his wife Mary, died on Aug. 9, according to a memorial page on the Texas Children's Hospital website.
"Our beloved son Henry passed away. He had the softest blue eyes, an easy smile and a contagious giggle. We always surrounded him with love and he returned it, and so much more," Engel wrote, before giving another update in a follow-up post, "Researchers are making amazing progress using Henry's cells to help cure Rett Syndrome so others don't have to endure this terrible disease."
Henry was first diagnosed with the disorder in 2017. Engel spoke to PEOPLE in January 2018 about his son's diagnosis, noting at the time that his son was "probably not going to walk, probably not going to speak, probably not going to have any mental capacity beyond the level of a 2-year-old."
Months later, in October 2018, the journalist opened up in a candid essay for Today about his family's harrowing journey and his son's condition.
At the time, Engel said it was getting "increasingly difficult" to help Henry keep active "because of basic physics," as the parents had to move their son constantly to help keep him engaged in his surroundings — something that led Engel's wife Mary to start "working out like mad" to keep up with the physical demands of parenting.
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In August 2019, Engel and his wife welcomed another little boy, son Theodore, into their family and spoke with PEOPLE about the adjustment at home.
Engel said that it would be "difficult" to watch baby Theo pass their son Henry, 3 at the time, with certain developmental milestones.
"We know why there is this differential. And it's going to be hard to watch Theo pass his older brother in terms of capabilities," he said. "That's going to be very difficult for us to see. To see a 1-month-old very soon overcoming his almost-4-year-old brother … that's going to be tough."
Read the original article on People